Corruption? This is small stuff

In a way, Labour's apologists are right. It is a small affair: paltry, tawdry and squalid. Next to the gazillions misspent by the state, one man's hidden gift of Â£670,000 is a petty misdemeanour. As Matthew Parris puts it in a brilliant piece, "We're not talking the Old Bailey here; not even Crown Court. We're talking Woking Magistrates' Court on a wet winter Tuesday".

LabourÂ is responsible for far greater misdemeanors

Don't get me wrong: I don't want to let anyone off the hook. Labour introduced these rules on party funding in a smug, almost pharisaical, way. The sight of that party now breaking its own laws is sordid. All I'm saying is that there are worse instances of corruption, of corruption with public money. Here are some examples, plucked more or less at random.

1. The award of defence contracts. As the MP Douglas Carswell keeps pointing out, our colossal defence budget at Â£32 billion, the second largest in the world is spent in the interest of our defence contractors rather than of our soldiers. We are suffering preventable casualties in Afghanistan for want of helicopters, while billions are squandered on the Eurofighter, the Trident replacement etc.

2. The indulgence of tyrants who happen to be rich. Why do we treat Saudi Arabia as "our key ally in the region" when we sanction Burma and Zimbabwe? Why did we traduce our judicial process by halting the inquiry into whether BAE had bribed Saudi princelings? Because a number of people in public life hope, in due course, to take their places on the boards of Saudi-funded companies.

3. The funneling of cash into marginal constituencies. This can happen either through the award of government contracts the building of the proposed aircraft carriers near Gordon Brown's seat, for example or through setting the amount of money that the Treasury gives each town hall. The rise in local government spending across Northern England and Scotland has enlarged the class of people who depend on state spending, and who are therefore likelier to vote for the high-tax party.

4. The engorgement of the state payroll. It can never be pointed out too often that most of the new jobs created in Britain over the past decade have been in the public sector. We have employed millions of regulators, inspectors, licensors, clerks, outreach workers, liaison officers, strategy advisers and compliance administrators. How many of these are going to vote for a tax-cutting party?

5.The ravening EU budget. Last month, for the thirteenth year in a row, the Court of Auditors refused to sign off on the EU accounts. Once again, there were perfunctory and ritualistic pledges of reform. But, in truth, no one has any incentive to fix the problem: too many people are doing well out of it.

I could go on, but you get my point. The real abuses take place within the letter of the law, and involving other people's money. That is why we should be so outraged by the idea that the idea that the correct response to l'affaire Abrahams is state funding for political parties. Taking a few thousand quid from an eccentric involves a breach of the rules. But compelling millions of pounds from all of us is monstrous.